The 19th Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival (SMHAF), brought communities together across Scotland from 20 October to 9 November, exploring this year’s theme Comfort & Disturb. The 2025 programme had over 240 events, reaching audiences of over 17,500 in areas across Scotland.
Read on for our festival highlights, and download our festival reports to find out more.
Highlights
Comfort and Disturb
Our 2025 festival theme referenced the famous Cesar A Cruz quote about art as activism, the idea that “art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable”. One of our founding principles is to provide a platform for often marginalised artists to tell their own mental health stories in their own way. Sometimes this act can be comforting, sometimes it is disturbing, often it is most powerful when it is both.
SMHAF at Civic House
Our vibrant programme at Civic House featured Are You Sitting Comfortably?, a mental health themed theatre showcase, a live A Kick Up the Arts podcast featuring conversation and music, a Participatory Arts & Mental Health Symposium, and Moving Minds, a family-friendly of community, creativity and celebration.
Film
This year’s film programme featured imaginative and deeply personal cinema exploring mental health. Highlights included the opening night screening of Myrid Carten’s acclaimed documentary A Want In Her at Filmhouse and the International Film Awards, which saw the Grand Jury Prize presented to Ane-Martha Tamnes Hansgård’s DIAGNONSENSE by special guest David Hayman.
Artist Commissions
Artists Erin McGrath, HUSS, Robyn Woolston and Rylan Gleave were commissioned to create new pieces of work in response to this year’s festival theme. Their work explores post-natal depression, disability, displacement, and living with a brain tumour diagnosis, each from a deeply personal perspective rooted in lived experience.
Writing
This year’s writing event was held at Cowdray Hall in Aberdeen, in partnership with WayWORD at the University of Aberdeen. It featured a live literary showcase, with folksinger Iona Fyfe and spoken word artist Mae Diansangu, readings by shortlisted writers from our annual competition, and a new published collection illustrated by Rosa Eisenberg.
Regional & Touring Programmes
There were over 240 events in urban and rural locations all across Scotland – from Caithness to Edinburgh, and Aberdeen to Dumfries – spanning music, film, theatre, visual arts, storytelling, creative workshops and more. Highlights included Leah Shelton’s one-woman tour-de-force BATSHIT, the 13th Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition, and ten new projects in Aberdeen, Dundee and towns and rural areas across Scotland supported through our Regional Participatory Arts Fund.
Impact
Audiences
91% of respondents to our audience survey described their experience as Good or Very Good.
74% of respondents to our audience survey said that attending the festival Positively or Very Positively impacted their mental health.
Audiences valued the diversity in how mental health was represented and the sharing of lived experiences. Many found the experience uplifting, sometimes more helpful than traditional services, and valued the sense of community and empathy it fostered. Feedback also highlighted inspiration for personal creativity and advocacy, reinforcing SMHAF’s impact in reducing stigma and promoting positive change.
I find these kind of events more useful to me than a GP referral to an underwhelming service..
I was struggling specifically around the time the event was on and had tried to access help with my medication. Attending the event I felt comforted that so many people do care about mental health.
I feel motivated to see through my plans to write, which would be my outlet.
I left with an urgency to take action on mental health issues that matter to me personally, I felt compelled to stand up for them and discuss them openly, often referencing films that I engaged with at the festival.
I was struggling specifically around the time the event was on and had tried to access help with my medication. Attending the event I felt comforted that so many people do care about mental health.
Artists
100% of respondents to our artist survey felt that their involvement with SMHAF Positively or Very Positively impacted their mental health.
100% of respondents to our artist survey felt that their involvement with SMHAF Positively or Very Positively impacted their creative work.
Artists consistently praised SMHAF for creating a safe, flexible and supportive environment. The team’s empathy, patience and encouragement allowed creative freedom beyond typical commissioned work. Many felt “seen” and valued, noting intentional programming and marketing efforts that amplified their work. The festival was described as a light and welcoming space, even when addressing challenging topics.
The conditions in which to make my work were freer and more flexible than other commissions I have taken. This and the kindness and positivity from the team allowed me to experiment with my concept and ideas in a style unlike much work written to brief.
The festival has offered a dynamic yet sustaining platform for my practice – providing both support and encouragement, whilst making room for the type of sensitive and so, so necessary conversations that are critical in terms of helping societies to flourish.”
It has felt safe and supportive both as a practical environment to come into as an artist, but also as a supported culture to be able to speak about important things with audiences.
Partners
The Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival 2025 was led by the Mental Health Foundation, with support from national partners:
- Creative Scotland
- Thrive Edinburgh
- Edinburgh Health & Social Care Partnership
- Baring Foundation
- Film Hub Scotland, part of the BFI’s Film Audience Network, and funded by Screen Scotland and National Lottery funding from the BFI.
- Glasgow 850
- NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde
- The List
Organisations that supported us by coordinating our regional networks included:
- CAPS Independent Advocacy
- Creativity in Care
- DG Creative Wellbeing and Outpost Arts
- Live Borders
- Mikey’s Line
- NHS Borders
- NHS Lanarkshire
- North Ayrshire Health & Social Care Partnership
- Renfrewshire Health & Social Care Partnership
Thank you to all our partners and the hundreds of organisations, communities, and individuals who participated in the festival this year.
About the Festival
The Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival aims to use the arts and creativity to explore how we can help to prevent mental health problems and support people to live mentally healthier lives.
For more information about the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival and how to get involved for
2026, please get in touch at smhaf@mentalhealth.org.uk.
Our innovative approach, combining high artistic quality with grassroots support, community engagement and social activism, has been replicated internationally.
